


The Grand Optimist

by Starlithorizon



Category: Cabin Pressure
Genre: Gen, Mourning, hopeful i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-10
Updated: 2013-08-10
Packaged: 2017-12-23 00:35:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/919901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starlithorizon/pseuds/Starlithorizon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even with what felt like his father's disapproval from beyond the grave, Martin Crieff carried on.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Grand Optimist

The attic was suitably cold and dark, the shadows and damp chill slinking in close like an embrace. Usually, both things felt cruel, but tonight, they felt like condolences. He sat on his sagging bed, staring out the window and twisting his father's ring on his finger. He was still wearing the black suit and tie, which was a bit musty from living in the cupboard of his damp attic for so many years. The sad part was that it was a bit big on him, and when he'd gotten it, he was a scrawny sixteen-year-old feeling anxious about an upcoming dance.

The darkness and coldness fit the day, Martin thought.

All through the drive home, he heard the gentle hiss of dirt against the lid of his father's casket. It slithered through his head maliciously, throwing in the occasional clunk as his father's van jostled over a bump in the road and the things in the back jumped. The side of the van still had the logo and number for his father's business, and Martin just felt so _defeated_.

Yes, of course it was horrible that he'd lost his father. It had been terrible seeing his booming and beaming father so pale and still in that hospital bed after his heart attack. It had been wretched when he'd gotten the phone call. But all the same, Martin wanted to yell at the man for leaving him nothing more than a rickety van, a few tool kits, and a goddamn _multimeter_. He wanted to shout and beat his breast and demand that his father just _believe in him for once_! It hurt like a gunshot wound, knowing that his own _father_ didn't think he could do it.

He'd cried a bit when the priest read out a verse during the funeral. He cried a bit more when the coffin was lowered in the ground. But now, hours later, he felt numb. He felt like he'd slipped beneath the surface of a frozen lake, and he couldn't be sure if there was something wrong with that or now. Martin just sat on his bed, staring at the darkening sky through a gleaming window.

He'd lived in this awful attic for about six years now, and while it was tidy and comfortable, it wasn't really home. It felt like failure, more than anything. He was working at a local Italian restaurant as a busboy, and that was because the manager had decided that he really wasn't suited to dealing with the patrons. That was a harsh rejection. He didn't have any friends, he didn't have any prospects, he didn't have anything but his father's van.

As the sky darkened further, Martin Crieff just stared out the window, blank as slate and icewater numb.

* * *

"No, see, the tail goes on like _this_."

The voice was warm and a bit heavy and very soft as it spoke to Martin. Small fingers twitched as larger fingers gently slotted the piece into place. A small face broke into a grin, and the larger counterpart did the same.

"And the wings? Cause a plane can't fly without any wings!"

"Of course. Would you like to put this one on?"

The kitchen smelled of glue and baking bread and his mother's perfume. She bustled around the kitchen, occasionally sparing glances for the eldest Crieff child through the window above the sink as he ran around the garden with the Keller boy. At the table, Martin and his father were bent over a tiny Spitfire, the second model they'd put together.

Over the years, the pair would bond over aeroplanes, building dozens of models and occasionally drive down to a field to watch the planes take off and land at Heathrow. Martin's father also took the time to teach him basic electrical and handy skills. Simon didn't get nearly the same sort of effort simply because he didn't take to it the way Martin had.

Though he'd never really said as much, their father believed in Martin implicitly and completely. He believed in all of his children, of course, but he always felt that Martin needed more of that cast his way. But, alas, Martin had always taken poorly to failure and thrown himself into something just above poverty, scrabbling and fighting just to keep his head above water. He absolutely refused any help from his parents, which broke his father's heart just as surely as it bolstered it.

Martin was a fighter, that much was certain.

So the youngest Crieff had gotten the potential to either start his own business or carry on his father's as he would invariably fight to get what he wanted so badly. He got the worn gold ring that had already been passed down three generations, not Simon.

While Martin had trouble translating the gentle words of his inheritance, he struggled and fought and kicked and bit and eventually made it.

Two months after finding himself the owner of a rickety old van, Martin passed his CPL.

Two months after that, he was a pilot.

Two months after that, he was finally happy.

* * *

Martin Crieff was many things, and as it became quite obvious to anyone who would ever meet him, ever, _determined_ was the adjective which fit him most aptly. Even during the darkest days, when his stomach grumbled from dawn to dusk and he received yet another letter telling him he'd failed, he'd stubbornly carry on. When his muscles ached and his eyes felt heavy from mute exhaustion, he'd keep going. When his first officer made a dig that was just a little too sharp, he'd struggle onward.

He knew, in his heart of hearts, that he was meant for so much, and eventually, he learned that his father had known it as well.

The night his mother told him that his father had believed in him, he'd fallen asleep with a smile on his face that refused to fade for weeks after. He was the grand optimist, and he wasn't alone.

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from a City and Colour song of the same title.


End file.
